Investors love dividends. For decades smart individuals and some of the country’s best fund managers have followed a simple strategy: pile into the best dividend-paying stocks and watch the money roll in. We can’t get enough of dividends and for good reason. First, they are an important

Growing numbers of borrowers have been cashing in on property price rises by releasing money to pay for home improvements, fund buy-to-let deposits and consolidate debts using “second charge” mortgages. Brokers have been recommending this little-known form of lending, which some have called

With the marriage of the supermodel Kate Moss to the musician Jamie Hince on the rocks, as well as that of the actors Ben Affleck and Jennifer Garner, divorce is once again headline news. The celebrity splitters will no doubt be employing the best lawyers and advisers to make sure that financially

When the first state pension was introduced by David Lloyd George 106 years ago most people didn’t receive a penny. Considered radical when introduced, you had to be 70 to receive it at a time when only one in three adult males survived that long (today it’s eight out of ten). Yet, it was pretty

Nearly half of all households in the UK are owed money by their energy supply and are being urged to consider taking advantage of new rules to claim back a total of up to £1.1 billion of overpayments. According to uSwitch, the price comparison website, 12 million homes are in credit with their

Most UK-based investors have watched the stockmarket madness going on in China with detached bemusement. As the country’s equity bubble inflated and then burst they have sat back secure in the knowledge that they don’t have a penny invested directly in Chinese shares. Such complacency, though, may

Homeowners are being unfairly barred from taking their mortgages with them when moving to another property by inflexible, “box-ticking” lenders applying new rules too rigidly, according to a report by the Financial Ombudsman Service (FOS). In its latest “ombudsman news” review the FOS — the

Amid the confusion that has bedevilled the first months of pensions freedom, one thing has been clear: some investors do not want to pay for advice. Savers have reacted with anger when told that, unless they employ a financial adviser, they cannot invest their pension as planned. So much so, that

We all know the advice: only buy art you love, that you would be happy to look at for the rest of your life. Forget about its investment potential, say the art experts. However, as you are reading this in the Money section, ignoring the opportunities to profit from art would seem remiss. Even if

The fear and passion that inheritance tax provokes is out of all proportion to its impact. Some 8 per cent of people who die this year, about 44,000 people, are expected to have to pay the tax. In three years, if things stay the same, it is expected to be 54,000, or 10 per cent. One in ten is not